{"id":406,"date":"2010-10-26T01:00:49","date_gmt":"2010-10-26T01:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/?p=406"},"modified":"2010-10-26T01:18:59","modified_gmt":"2010-10-26T01:18:59","slug":"lequeracabuu-school-is-finished","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/?p=406","title":{"rendered":"Lequeracabu’u school is finished!"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>Less than 6 months after The White Party raised the money to build Lequeracabu’u village a school, it is finished and open.<\/p>\n

The opening ceremony last Friday was both an extraordinary adventure and incredibly moving.<\/p>\n

We travelled\u00a0 in convoy from Dili with Kirsty Sword Gusmao’s car along a pretty scary narrow road next to the coast towards the town of Baucau. \u00a0\u00a0The road is about one lane wide and hugs the most spectacular coastline.\u00a0 We dodged goats, pigs and frighteningly at times, children, as we drove for about 3 hours (it is only 100 km) to Baucau.\u00a0 We then\u00a0turned off the bitumen road onto a dirt road.\u00a0 We\u2019d all been praying for no rain, because there was a very real chance that the road could be closed and we wouldn\u2019t be able to get through.\u00a0 It had poured the night before though and we were\u00a0worried about how bad the road would be.<\/p>\n

\u00a0We managed to get a few kilometres along\u00a0the road\u00a0until we hit this extraordinary strip of deep churned up mud in which both of our cars managed to get well and truly stuck.\u00a0\u00a0 Everyone\u00a0 got out of the cars, rolled up their trousers and plodded around in the mud, ripping up branches to put under the wheels and pushing cars.\u00a0 Kirsty (who had been in a lead car that had got through) came back, squelched through the mud and had a great time photographing the proceedings.\u00a0 \u00a0Finally someone produced a car with a winch and we got the cars out.\u00a0 From there it was another half hour of at times terrifying off road driving, down muddy, rutted roads and slaloming along roads that had turned to mud.\u00a0 But we all got there, dirty and with our shoes covered in mud, but very happy to be there.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The villagers had made some temporary shelters for the festivities and we walked down towards them and the school to the drumming of an honour \u00a0guard of villagers in traditional dress and carrying swords.\u00a0 There were about 600 people from Lequeracabu\u2019u and some of the neighbouring villages there.\u00a0 Once we were seated, the festival began with dancing and singing and then speeches.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kirsty spoke \u00a0(in Tetum) \u2013 she is extraordinarly revered in Timor as the mother of the nation and there were a lot of the villagers with tears running down their faces, particularly some of the older men.\u00a0 We had the sense that this was a once in the lifetime event for these people who have endured, and continue to endure, so much hardship. \u00a0I spoke (with Kirsty translating for me).\u00a0 I explained that the money had come from people in many different countries who had all been following the progress of the school and that many people around the world were thinking of them and their school.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The school is fantastic and it is in the most extraordinary location \u2013 it is an incredibly beautiful and remote area.\u00a0 After the speeches Kirsty unveiled the plaque which is mounted on a pedestal outside the front of the school and she and I cut the ribbon over the front door. Then we all ate \u2013 there were about 20 different dishes lined up on a big long table and tall sculpted piles of rice.\u00a0 It was\u00a0really good and and when you know how little the villagers\u00a0normally have to eat, a meal like that would be an amazing feast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After the meal we gave away 100 school packs to the kids, which each contained school shirts, soap, toothbrush, books etc.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0The children\u00a0were wide eyed and\u00a0 were all still holding the packs unopened\u00a0 in their arms when we left.\u00a0<\/p>\n

We went for a walk through the village which is a little way from the school, it is terribly poor and basic.\u00a0 The old school, if possible, was even worse than it looked in the photos we all saw.\u00a0 The contrast to their new beautiful, big new three classroom school was amazing.\u00a0\u00a0 All in all it was an incredible day.<\/p>\n

\u00a0More news shortly about plans to spend the rest of the money raised for the school and the village.\u00a0 Also news to come about the new school site we saw for our next project.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Less than 6 months after The White Party raised the money to build Lequeracabu’u village a school, it is finished and open. The opening ceremony last Friday was both an extraordinary adventure and incredibly moving. We travelled\u00a0 in convoy from Dili with Kirsty Sword Gusmao’s car along a pretty scary narrow road next to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[5],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=406"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":425,"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406\/revisions\/425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spenditwell.com\/updates\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}